Quantifying and Measuring Morphological Complexity

It is a standard assumption in Linguistics that all human languages are equally (and enormously) complex; when looked at as a whole, no language can be called “simpler” than another. Certainly, languages can differ in the distribution of their complexity, so that one might employ a richer inflectional system, or entertain a more complicated gamut of syllable shapes than another, but it is generally supposed that these differences must “even out” as one considers entire linguistic systems. Where there is atypical simplicity in morphology, for instance, it is assumed that one will find compensatory complexity in possible syntactic distinctions, or subtle lexical differences, or something else. A number of researchers have recently begun to approach this equal complexity hypothesis as an empirical claim to be tested under particular definitions of complexity. Perhaps the most famous recent example is McWhorter’s (2001) controversial claim that “creole grammars are the world’s simplest grammars,” but see also Juola (1998), Shosted (2006), Nichols (2007), and Pellegrino et al. (2007). The hypothesis deserves formal articulation and scrutiny because it suggests some important consequences, if confirmed: